Studio Brief 1 - Reflective Practice - Poster

Research Poster 

When coming up with ideas for each of the points I found that many of them related to my physical practice so this has became the focus of the poster.

Two things learnt:

- Collect and Research
By collecting things that interest me such as examples of different styles of design, interesting typography,  offcuts, textures etc this has allowed me to gain a body of inspiration aswell as encouraging me to look at things more thoughtfully. Basing work on research whether this be artist influence, word definitions, theories etc has been particularly important in the development of my work.

- List
By using post it notes as a way of writing down things to do or remember this has allowed me to make sure things get done and prevents me forgetting important things.

Two things that have engaged me:

- Restrictions
Within Studio Practice I have found that the use of restrictions has provided more focus to my work and enables greater consistency in the style of each piece. By having restrictions it provides a starting point from which to start, which makes the beginning of a project much easier. It has also provided me with a series of ideas to start a project with, which helps with the initial uncertainty as to what to do.

- Experiment
Again within Studio Practice there has been a particular focus on experimentation with both digital and analogue techniques. Using a range of processes has provided me with a series of techniques to tackle projects with. I have particularly found that photography, collage and the photocopier have been interesting techniques, which can also overlap to create more exciting work.

Aims and Ambitions for next year an beyond:

- Colour
Next year I hope to become more confident when using colour because at the moment I still feel a little uncertain as to whether things work or not.

- Projects / Workshops
I would like to try and make more time for projects outside the course whether this be live briefs or personal projects or playing more in the workshops.

Two things not enjoyed:

- Documenting
In our first few modules I have found it particularly hard to keep up with documenting my work, in both my blog and sketchbook. In our last project, because of the amount of work I was producing it was hard to keep on top of the documenting aswell as keep up with the pace of creating new work. This meant that much of the blogging was left until the end of the project which made the end of the module quite stressful. To prevent this in later modules it will be better to focus my ideas and what I am creating so I can better balance the work with documentation.

- Time
Keeping up with my work takes up much of my time which can be hard sometimes. It can also be quite frustrating when you spend a long time doing something and it doesn't always pay off making it feel like wasted time which can be frustrating.

Designing the Poster 

For each of the points I wanted to reflect the physical properties of the thing or action. This was reflected through an action or material examples used in the process. Different types of paper used in my process were used to reflect some of the points whereas the structure of the poster signified others. Initially I was going to use basic shapes, (squares, circles and triangles) as a restriction however I found that these were quite hard to arrange in an aesthetic way. Using just squares made the design very structured, whereas circles looked more organic which I liked.

How each point was visualised:
- Collect was shown through the compilation of the different materials
- List was shown through the use of post it notes
- Restriction was visualised through the use of the same shape for all the different components and the gridded paper which gives structure to the creation of elements
- Experiment was shown through the use of photocopies which is something I have begun to use a lot in my projects
- Colour is represented through the use of abstract mono-prints that mixed various colours
- Projects / Workshops is visualised through a wood texture to reflect my interested in wood and the 3D workshop
- Documenting is shown through the use of sketchbook paper which reflects the process of bringing all my work into a physical format
- Time is visualised through black card with tracing paper over the top, this muted the intensity of the black whilst also creating a moon like bubbled effect over the top.

Presenting the design in a physical way, rather than scanning the design into the computer and printing it, I thought reflected the concept of process more and allowed the piece to become more tactile. Using a warm, off white paper meant that all the elements could stand out.